Springfield Township residents to PPL: Don't tread on our rural areas. Two-thirds of voters in Springfield on Tuesday signed an election-day petition meant to pressure PPL Corp. to consider alternate routes to a new power line it is proposing in Upper Bucks, the latest signal of opposition to the proposal. The grass-roots Springfield Bucks Undesirable Land Use group garnered 788 signatures at Springfield polling places, compared with a turnout of 1,182, said Bruce Whitesell, the organization's chairman.

By Pamela Varkony Special to The Morning Call - Freelance | February 3, 2008

The room at the National Press club was standing-room only. Sitting on the dais were two familiar faces, former Reagan National Security Adviser Robert "Bud" McFarlane and former Arkansas Sen. Tim Hutchinson. The Afghanistan Advocacy Group, citizens who promote dialog between U.S. and Afghan policymakers, held the Jan. 25 event to hear presidential candidates on Afghanistan and Pakistan. McFarlane represented Sen. John McCain, Hutchinson his former governor Mike Huckabee, and Denis McDonough, a former foreign policy adviser for former Senate Democratic Leader Tom Daschle, was there for Sen. Barack Obama.

The Morning Call's Oct. 31 editorial recommending candidates for Lehigh County commissioner overlooked an important area, public safety. As a firefighter for the last 17 years, five as a volunteer and more than 12 as a career firefighter, and also as a deputy emergency management coordinator for Allentown, I believe I can bring a unique perspective to the board. County government must be prepared to protect its citizens, and often, the people who are charged with creating the plans to protect the citizenry are pushed aside for the pet projects of elected officials.

By G. Terry Madonna and Michael Young, Special to The Morning Call - Freelance | August 19, 2007

On its surface, the political fracas about tolling I-80 is simple enough. Folks in rural northern Pennsylvania don't want to pay more to use their highway so folks in urban southeastern Pennsylvanians can pay less for their mass transit. From the rural perspective, Gov. Ed Rendell's plan to collect tolls on I-80 is highway robbery. From the urban perspective, it's just asking rural Pennsylvanians to pay their fair share. But on closer inspection, a more complex picture emerges, a lesson in geopolitics that uncovers major fault lines in state politics, including sectionalism, ideology, partisanship, and urban-rural conflict.

Every year, Roseto's Big Time festival brings dozens of teenagers to Forrest Meyers' neighborhood, and every year, he has to tell them not to sit on the wall outside his house. He even puts up little humorous warning signs. One sign shows the Three Stooges, and reads "Look you chowderhead, I told you, no sitting on the wall." Another tells visitors "Let's say you're a historic figure, like Gandhi or somebody like that. You still cannot sit on the wall." Still, keeping people from sitting on the wall has been a losing battle, part of the reason why Meyers was glad the Slate Belt Guardian Angels made his backyard their base of operations last week during the festival.

A juvenile black bear that had been wandering around Lehigh County for the past week, causing a stir in Allentown area neighborhoods, was captured Wednesday night in an Upper Macungie woods and was being moved to a rural area. The bear, which is believed to weigh 100 to 120 pounds, was tranquilized by state Game Commission wildlife conservation officers near 1618 Fieldstone Court, just north of Hilltop Road, said Wildlife Conservation Officer Matthew Teehan. Officers attached identification tags to the bear's ears to help track it if it gets into trouble again and to monitor the bear population.

If you enjoy watching wildlife, it's hard to imagine any investment yielding a higher return than a hummingbird feeder. For about the price of a movie ticket, you can enjoy five months of high-speed aerial antics right outside your living room window. A basic feeder costs well under $10. Add a little sugar water, and you've got all the needed ingredients to lure one of Mother Nature's marvels to your backyard. Ruby-throated hummingbirds -- the only hummingbird species that nests in the Eastern United States -- are extremely charismatic creatures.

Three years after its landmark report, "Back to Prosperity," on how to revitalize Pennsylvania municipalities and economy, The Brookings Institution is issuing a follow-up study today. In short, there's good news, but not enough. Considerable challenges remain. While there has been a growing mood and appreciation for the need to change the way things work in Pennsylvania, there hasn't been enough progress to reverse the fiscal decline of the state's urban areas. And, those challenges exist from Philadelphia to Erie and affect all the rural areas in between.

On Granger Road in Lehigh Township, a bond and friendship built over 30 years will last a lifetime. Even though the rural neighborhood spans nearly a mile, the kinship of the families is unique. About 10 families have experienced many milestones together: the first day of kindergarten and the last day of high school; graduation from nursery school and graduation from college; birthday parties and family New Year's Eve parties; snowy day get-togethers and sledding events; neighborhood picnics and barn dances; campouts and cookouts; Eagle Scout celebrations and wedding ceremonies; playing in the nearby creek and swimming in the pond.

Former Lehigh County Judge Thomas A. Wallitsch expected the judicial system in Afghanistan to be backward, especially in rural areas. What he didn't expect to find were one-room courthouses with no phones and no electricity, clerks handwriting documents, rampant corruption and judges who didn't have the equivalent of high school educations and didn't know the country's laws. "It was like going back 300 years," said Wallitsch, who spent seven months in the country this past spring and summer as a senior judicial adviser in the Afghanistan Rule of Law Project of the U.S. Agency for International Development.